The anniversary of the National Day of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, on the 27th of April 2016, offers us the utmost pleasure of conveying to the Dutch people, our warmest congratulations and best wishes for happiness, peace and prosperity.
For the Dutch people, King’s Day – Het Koningsdag – is an opportunity to honour and value their past and history, but also to celebrate the present and the remarkable achievements of their country.
Last year, Romania and the Netherlands celebrated 135 years of bilateral diplomatic relations. The bilateral ties between both the two countries and the Dutch and Romanian people extended significantly over the past years due to a continuous political dialogue, an active economic cooperation and intensive educational and cultural exchanges. This year, the high level political dialogue has been marked by the visit to Netherlands of H.E. Mr. Dacian Cioloș, Prime Minister of Romania, when fruitful talks were held on various issues, with a strong view on the economic opportunities and close cooperation within the European Union.
As EU and NATO partners and allies, Romania and the Netherlands share a common vision embedded in their commitment for a united and prosperous Europe based on democracy, rule of law, stability, security and economic growth. Both countries are engaged to ensure a peaceful future, sustainable development of their economies and societies, and prosperity for their citizens. Our countries, as well as all the EU countries, must cope with new circumstances and challenges, at European and international level, such as sustainable economic growth, creation of more jobs, an efficient solution for the refugees’ crisis, and last but not least the fight against terrorism.
Romania is particularly pleased to congratulate the Netherlands for the way is managing the challenging agenda of the Presidency of the Council of the European Union and extends its full support for a successful Dutch Presidency.
From the economic perspective, the Kingdom of the Netherlands is the biggest foreign investor in Romania, with more than 8.5 billion Euro investment in more than 4.750 companies with Dutch capital. By the end of December last year, the economic exchanges amounted to 3.906 million Euro, thus exceeding the total value of the bilateral exchanges registered in 2014 and the previously peak-volume achieved in 2013 (3.375 million Euro). An increase is expected for this year too. Romania is interested to attract even more Dutch investors in a wide range of areas – public-private partnerships for major infrastructure projects, water management, manufacturing (particularly of auto parts, aerospace and wood products), renewable energies, ICT services, agro-industry and food processing, pharmaceuticals and chemicals, consumer goods, tourism.
The Dutch-Romanian special links have recently grown stronger in a moment of high distress by the tragic fire catastrophe COLECTIV in Bucharest, last October. The Netherlands helped a number of wounded victims in the Dutch hospitals. A special word of appreciation goes to the Dutch authorities and medical teams for their high professionalism, efforts, and solidarity showed in their rescue. The Romanian authorities are highly grateful to all those so highly involved.
On this important occasion, we would also like to address our congratulations to the Dutch community living in Romania! Both the Dutch community in Romania and the Romanian community in the Netherlands represent durable bridges of cooperation and mutual understanding between the Romanian and Dutch peoples!
Romania wil het Koninkrijk der Nederlanden en het Nederlandse volk veel geluk en welzijn toewensen! Happy National Day!
